A former member of al-Qaeda says that the leader of the terrorist al-Nusra Front in Syria is a CIA operative.

“I personally believe that the leader of the Nusra Army who declared his support for Ayman al-Zawahiri, is a CIA operative in the al-Nusra,” Sheikh Nabil Naiim, who led an al-Qaeda training camp in Egypt, made the revelation in a recent video testimony.

Addressing the al-Qaeda-linked al-Nusra militants, Naiim said, “You are fighting the war in Syria on America’s behalf.”

Naiim, who has renounced violence, also identified al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri as a US double agent.

Abu Mohammed al-Jawlani, head of the terrorist al-Nusra Front, pledged allegiance to al-Zawahiri on April 10.

Naiim was a high profile militant in Egypt and is believed to be involved in the assassination of former Egyptian president Anwar al-Sadat in 1981. He was released from prison after the regime of Hosni Mobarak collapsed in February 2011.

He said the United States funded and supported al-Qaeda in Afghanistan for 18 years and that he was personally “fooled by an American plot.”

The United Nations Security Council has added the al-Nusra Front operating in Syria to the UN sanctions blacklist.

The terrorist group has been behind hundreds of deadly bombings targeting both government and civilian institutions including hospitals and schools across Syria since the conflict began in March 2011.

The group is also responsible for killing American troops in Iraq.

According to US media reports, the US military has been secretly training some militant groups since November last year.

The United States has begun shipping weapons to Jordan to arm the militants in neighboring Syria, after the White House said the Syrian government had used chemical weapons against the militants. Damascus has strongly rejected the allegation.

Syria crisis started as pro-reform protests but with interventions by the United States, UK and their regional and Western allies it soon turned to a massive insurgency which took in numerous terrorist groups from all over Europe and the Middle East to wage one of the bloodiest wars the region has ever experienced.

The war, which many fear is turning to a “war of hatred”, has already taken more than 90,000 lives.